Permit values
Solar installation cost in Raleigh–Durham
Declared value is what the contractor reported to the building department, which is what the permit fee is calculated from. It is usually the contract value excluding tax, and it runs below a retail quote. Treat it as the floor of the market, not the price. Why the permit and the quote disagree.
What the spread looks like
Every valued permit in the window, grouped by declared value. The last bar holds everything above the 95th percentile, so one unusually large job does not flatten the rest.
Month by month
| Month | Permits valued | Median |
|---|---|---|
| August 2026 | 25 | — |
| September 2026 | 35 | — |
| October 2026 | 50 | $36,360 |
Complete calendar months only. The current month is left out until it ends.
Who pulled the most solar permits in Raleigh–Durham
By permit count over the same window, out of the contractors the building departments name.
- 18MSOLAR LLC27 (55.1%)
- 2NC SOLAR NOW INC12 (24.5%)
- 3TOP TIER SOLAR SOLUTIONS 873452 (4.1%)
- 4CATE ASSOCIATES INC2 (4.1%)
- 5COMPLETE SOLAR, INC2 (4.1%)
- 6SOUTHERN ENERGY MANAGEMENT INC2 (4.1%)
- 7NEXUS ENERGY SYSTEMS LLC1 (2%)
- 8CAPE FEAR SOLAR SYSTEMS1 (2%)
Method
Permit Dawn reads the building departments in City of Raleigh and Town of Cary permits with contractor name and phone, plus Wake County permits for Apex, Garner, Wake Forest, Knightdale, Morrisville and Fuquay-Varina. every night and keeps every residential permit they publish. This page counts the solar permits issued in August 2026, September 2026, October 2026 — 110 of them, 110 carrying a declared value (100%). Duplicates and permits a city later re-published are excluded, along with values below $500 and above $2,000,000, which are placeholders rather than jobs. Medians and quartiles, not averages: a handful of very large jobs would drag a mean somewhere no homeowner would recognise.